


The Valley Below

by wocket



Category: Real Person Fiction
Genre: Anal Sex, Angst, Awkward Tension, F/M, Guns, Jealousy, M/M, Oral Sex, POV Second Person, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-10
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2021-01-26 19:01:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21378997
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wocket/pseuds/wocket
Summary: Tim's been a big piece of your life for so long now, but things feel like they're starting to change.
Relationships: Tim McVeigh/Mike Fortier
Kudos: 2





	The Valley Below

During the spring of 1994, you and Tim spend most of your free time together, hanging out on the sofa in the trailer, watching movies or cartoons and ordering Chinese food.

This particular Saturday night has shifted from evening to the early hours of the morn without either of you two knowing or caring. You’re the first one to yawn, stretching your arms above your head and taking a look at Tim. “I don’t know if I can last much longer,” you admit.

Tim presses his cold toes against your ankles, knowing it drives you insane. He's still not used to the massive temperature shifts between day and night in the desert, more accustomed to the gradual weather changes of the East Coast. He tries to read the look on your face.

“Are you going to make me go to a motel?” Tim flirts.

You grin. “What’s in it for me?”

Something flashes in Tim’s eyes, and he’s on his knees in an instant, making eyes at you.

“Oh,” you breathe, and Tim presses his cheek to the inside of your thigh. You reach for your belt buckle but Tim stops you.

“Let me,” he tells you, pushing your hands out of the way so he can unbutton your pants and tug the zipper down. Tim’s normally shy but you like him like this, needy, hands wandering, and _hell_, so good with his tongue. He goes down on you with the mouth of an angel. His thin lips are talented, driving you wild. 

“That’s it,” you encourage, shuddering, flexing one hand against your thigh and reaching for Tim with the other. Tim’s so good at this, so talented with his mouth, putting in the same focused effort he uses for every important task. The sensation of your cock stretching his mouth is incredible.

Your hand grazes against Tim’s cropped hair. There’s nothing to grab; he keeps it in a neat military crew cut ever since he left the Army. Tim isn't anything out of the pages of a magazine, but you like him, like his intense face and sharp cheekbones and blunt attitude. His talent as a soldier had been what drew you to him initially. You developed a bond and you’re happy to have him hang around, especially if he keeps _this_ up.

Tim brings you to the edge a few times, pulling off your dick with a wet noise every time you’re about to come until he really does make you lose it.

You grab at his flannel, unable to think straight, and Tim takes everything you give him, sliding off your dick with a goofy smile after you come, wiping his lip with his thumb.

What a hell of a way to end the evening. You tug your boxers back up your legs but leave your jeans on the floor. 

You reach a hand out for Tim until you find your arms full of skinny white boy. You pull him closer than you need to, telling yourself it’s for the body heat. You stand there with him, half-hugging in your living room, until sleep gnaws at you again. “Okay. Bedtime.”

Tim follows you to your room without a second thought. It’s not unusual for him to take the guest bedroom or to just pass out in your bed, if you’re drunk or lonely enough. 

“You want —?” You mime a handjob, which, in retrospect, isn't sexy at all. 

Tim shakes his head, content with getting you off. He must be on one of those kicks where he needs to feel needed, which is fine by you.

You’re about to close your eyes when you remember your big surprise, wondering what Tim would think. He always has an opinion. 

“I want to show you something.” You pull a velvet box from the bureau. Inside is a diamond engagement ring. You pop the lid and show it to Tim, who gets real quiet. “Tim?” 

He doesn’t answer you.

“I thought you liked Lori.”

“I do,” Tim replies immediately. He’s usually honest, never gives you a reason to doubt him. His face looks off though, bothered. He’s never been good with sentimental stuff.

You press your nose against his temple. “Tim,” you say. “This is all just some fun, right?”

“Yeah, sure,” Tim agrees, but his voice sounds hollow. 

You don’t think Tim knows what he wants. 

Tim climbs out of bed and leaves the room and you expect to hear the door of the trailer slam, but he doesn’t leave, just disappears to another bedroom. You wait and see if he’ll come back, but he doesn’t, so you pull on a pair of sweatpants and go on a recovery mission.

Tim’s sitting on the edge of the bed in the guest bedroom in the dark.

“Tim,” you whisper, standing in the doorway. He doesn’t answer you, so you take a seat beside him. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“You didn’t.”

You know better. Tim, mercurial Tim, wouldn’t be lurking in the guest bedroom if he wasn’t bothered by something you said. You sigh.

“Come on,” you say, and you want to drag him back to bed. He just shrugs. “I can’t let such a good thing go,” you explain, hoping he’ll understand. “You know I want to have a family. And I’m not… I’m not…” You don’t know what to call it, gay, homosexual... You’ve never known what to call this affair between you two.

“Me neither,” Tim says quickly.

“You know, Lori kind of has a thing for you.”

Tim narrows his eyes. “Really?”

You nod. “She thinks you’re cute.”

Tim laughs at that. He’s never been great with women, but your girlfriend really does like him, thinks he’s smart and clever, even if a little overbearing at times.

“I think you’re cute,” you flirt, appealing to his ego. You bump your shoulders against his.

“Does she like me enough to let me sleep with her boyfriend?”

“Maybe you should let the two of us take care of you,” you suggest. “Maybe it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.”

“Are you asking me to stay?”

You wait a beat. “That’s up to you, Tim.”

He looks at you, and it seems like he might be considering it. Then something flashes in his eyes you don’t recognize.

“Touch me,” Tim begs quietly.

Sometimes you forget he’s six months older than you, when he’s like this, lonely, flawed, subservient. It’s so unlike him but he’s wound so tightly that there has to be a moment when the spring uncoils, doesn’t there?

You put your hand on the back of his neck. Your wide palm traps heat against his skin. 

Tim’s icy blue eyes flick to your face in the dark and you give him a kiss before pulling his head to your chest. Your thumb traces the shell of his ear.

Tim’s thin arms wrap around your midsection. He presses his cheek against your chest. You can smell him from here, the inescapable thin layer of sweat from the Arizona heat and his 2-in-1 shampoo/body wash.

You trace the curve of his ear with your thumb, the arch of his cheekbone, the angle of his jaw. You sweep your open palm over his shoulders and over his back. He’s yours, too, isn’t he? Just like Lori. 

“Will you come back to bed?”

Tim won’t answer you, but you stroke your hand over his shoulderblades. You follow the line of his spine with your index finger. You feed him with touch until his hurt simmers into something calmer.

“Let’s smoke a bowl,” you suggest, and that gets Tim to stir. You lead him back into your bedroom, where you grab the pipe and an off-brand Ziploc baggie that still has an eighth in it. You pack a bowl in the dark from muscle memory and pass it to Tim for greens. 

Tim takes a hit and passes it back, leaning away from you to blow out the smoke. You can see his thin shoulders start to droop as his body relaxes.

“I shouldn’t have brought it up. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not something I can change.”

“No,” you say, just in case he thinks he can change your mind. Tim’s a persuasive guy. “It doesn’t mean we can’t have fun,” you say, which is true. The more you consider it the less you think Lori would mind, in fact, she might be down to party herself sometime. You wouldn’t put it past her. She’s a special girl.

Tim kisses you, hard this time, a hand tangled in your shaggy brown hair. _It’s not regulation,_ you remember Tim saying, _but it’s sexy as hell_, he’d said, a rare compliment on your appearance. “I know. I’m not going to let it stop me.”

You didn’t expect it to. Nobody told Tim McVeigh what he couldn’t do.

You finish smoking the bowl before you turn your attention to Tim, but he’s sleepy and stoned now, lying back on your pillow. You find a spot next to him and try to settle in for a good night’s sleep. 

Tim grabs the blankets and pulls them up over your heads until you’re both in the dark.

“What the hell are you doing, soldier?”

“Shutting everything - everyone else - out,” he mumbles, trying to block out the world, before wrapping himself around you awkwardly with shy affection.

You wonder if Tim is really interested in you or if he just doesn’t want to be alone, but before your brain can analyze that topic to death, you drift off in slumber.

*

You decide to spend the next day cheering Tim up as a way to make up for your faux pas. You wake up and notice he’s not wrapped around you the way he was last night, so you sidle up to him and whisper a friendly greeting in his ear. “Hey.”

Tim stirs and watches you through one blue eye. “You’re up early.” Tim’s an early riser, always has been. Waking up at 0500 has never been a problem for your buddy while mornings in the Army had been a struggle for you.

“Thought we could drink a few beers; do a little marksmanship training.” Shooting in the backyard was the best part of living just outside city limits. 

Tim seems a little suspicious, like he knows it’s your way of trying to make sure he doesn’t feel like a third wheel to you and Lori, but he lets you try.

“Yeah, okay. Hold on a minute,” Tim tells you. He rolls out of bed. Bizarrely, he comes back over to you after pulling on a t-shirt and kisses you on the mouth.

You get up and look for your glasses. After you brush your teeth you retrieve your pistol from the bureau. You think Tim must be grabbing his Glock, which he usually keeps on his person, but he’s missing from the trailer when you walk into the living room. 

You’re pulling two cans of Coors Light from the fridge (breakfast of champions) when Tim comes back with an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle. You wolf-whistle. Now that’s a pretty sight. You hope the neighbors don’t get a glimpse of your boy holding _that_.

The two of you head out to the little plot of land that extends behind your trailer. It’s basically desert, like most of Kingman, where you’ve lived since you were seven.

“Watch out for the baby rattlers. Little shitters are everywhere,” you warn. You’ve been seeing them more and more lately, tiny bodies coiled in perfect circles, ready to strike. The young ones make less noise, slithering silently underfoot.

You thought you might set up a few empty cans as targets, but Tim’s already taking a knee in the dirt to shoot at rocks, trees, anything. You take a seat in a rusty lawnchair that you’ve been meaning to get rid of for ages and watch him. Tim seems in his element with a gun in his hands.

You shoot a few rounds off your pistol and Tim even lets you fire his AR-15 a few times. You’re not sure if his proud smile is for you or the weapon, but you’re happy he’s smiling all the same. Mission accomplished.

You hand the rifle back, content to watch Tim show off his skills for a while. Any complaints from the neighbors would be worth it, you think.

“Take a look at this motherfucker,” Tim calls after a couple of minutes. Anybody else would have motioned with the rifle, but Tim lifts his hand off the gun and points. Just beyond the edge of your failed garden, there’s an adult rattlesnake coiled at the border of the property, tail rattling. It must be the mama. 

“You kiss your mother with that mouth, McVeigh?”

You know it’s a mistake the moment the joke leaves your mouth. Tim’s face goes steely and his eyes go dark.

“I don’t know where she is,” he admits in a moment of vulnerability. “Haven’t for a while.”

Ah, fuck. You’re going to have to start keeping your mouth shut. Tim might be a wanderer but you didn’t mean to make him feel like a stranger.

You tug at the sleeve of Tim’s flannel, feeling dumb. “Hey. I’m sorry, I didn’t —”

“It’s okay. She’s been gone a long time,” Tim tells you. He looks through the sights.

You remember what your own mother said about Tim at Thanksgiving. She thought he was looking for something solid, to be accepted. _He likes you, Mike_, you remember your mom telling you in that weird, knowing tone of voice, but you thought it was just companionship. You wonder now what she might’ve seen that you didn’t. You don’t know if you’ll ever be able to give Tim what he needs. Is it possible that someone who loves the road so much could want a home so badly?

You watch Tim take aim with the rifle and shoot the rattlesnake. His aim is incredible. One shot and the snake is dead. _Who’s the cold-blooded one now,_ you think, as the snake’s death rattle comes to a stop.

“Check it out.”

The two of you walk out to the rattlesnake, where dark blood is starting to pool on the rocky sand. The bullet - far more powerful than snake shot - ripped through the reptile’s body, cleaving it in two. 

Tim starts to get a little too close and you start to reach for him out of habit. “Watch your step,” you say. A severed snake head can still bite; you’ve seen it before. Sometimes they maintain their reflexes even after death, nervous systems still wired to respond to external stimuli. It’s some of the creepiest shit you’ve ever seen. 

Tim stays out of the way. “I’ll be okay,” he tells you, and you hope he means it. You both stare at the dead snake with a gruesome fascination. “Come on,” Tim says, his hand lingering on your shoulder. “I’ll make you an omelette.”

Tim trades the AR-15 for a spatula, standing over your stove, stirring eggs and vegetables into something that resembles breakfast. He cooks more than Lori does, and he’s not bad. It’s a little domestic, even, if you take the guns out of the picture.

Your mind wanders, and you imagine some spectre of yourself that walks up behind him to give him the affection he craves. Is this what he was after? Your brain takes a full-on fucking trip and your strange fantasy generates the rest of the scene, two little boys running through the kitchen with toy six-shooters, playing cowboys and Indians.

_What the fuck?_

Blinking, you shake yourself out of the fugue and return to the present, where Tim is standing in front of you with a plate. “Still asleep?” Tim laughs fondly. You can tell the omelette has green peppers - your favorite - and you appreciate the small touch.

You’re charmed, but you feel like shit. You treated Tim like shit, pulling out a ring for someone else at a moment like that. You owe him more than this. Tim would have your back, you think, and you should have his.

Tim doesn’t mention last night; just watches you eat with a mysterious smile. You realize he didn’t even bother to make himself breakfast, and idly wonder if Lori will let you keep him. 

*

Tim disappears without a word the next day. It’s not unlike him, especially when he’s upset about something, so you wait for a phone call or one of his letters (you have a stack of his postcards hidden underneath the letters Lori sent you during basic training). It never comes.

You still feel kind of shitty about the other night, but you had to tell him sometime, didn’t you? You’ve been putting your foot in your mouth a lot lately. It’s no wonder Tim would rather be in the middle of nowhere instead of hanging out with you.

Almost a week later, Tim shows up at your trailer in the middle of the night. He’s edgy and irritated. You wonder immediately if he’s on something. You think he’s in disguise at first, trying to look tough, sporting a biker’s leather jacket and leather pants, along with the combat boots he normally wears. It takes you a moment to put everything together.

“Were you trying to get picked up?” The question comes out of your mouth before you can stop yourself.

Tim looks at the floor with shifty eyes, hands in his pockets.

“You were,” you accuse, standing up from the sofa in the blink of an eye. You move to stand in front of him, blocking him in. “Is this what you wanted?” You step forward until his back is pressed against the front door. You press your hand against his stomach over his thin white shirt, then slip your hand underneath. “You wanted some guy to feel you up? Take you home and wreck you?”

Tim’s eyes close. You see his Adam’s apple bob as he swallows.

Your hand skims over his stomach and down lower, past his belt buckle, over the bulge in his pants.

“What were you looking for, Tim?” You cup his half-hard dick through his pants. “You gonna do this every time we have a disagreement?”

A half-formed moan escapes his mouth. 

You press him against the door and tug at his leather jacket with your free hand. “What’s this, huh?” You start to push it off his shoulders. “Take this off.”

You wonder if he’s done this before, if he’s put on someone else’s clothes, used someone else’s name to achieve his means. You wonder how many men have pushed him against the wall of a club, how many strangers have gotten their hands on him. You wonder how long he plays his game, if he lets nameless men guess what he wants or if he cuts right to the chase. 

“What do you need?” you murmur in his ear. 

Tim kisses you before catching your eye. His body language is softer, open, and you think you know what he wants. 

“Use words, honey.” The affectionate nickname slips out without you meaning for it to. It’s something you’re more likely to call Lori, but Tim’s eyes are soft, and his slender arms are looped around your neck. He’s inching forward and grinding against your thigh, his way of begging to be used. If Tim wanted to top you tonight, he’d have already bossed you into the bedroom.

You reach down, run your hands over his slim hips and over his backside. You squeeze.

Tim groans. “Want you inside me. Come on, Mike.”

He buries his face in your hair. You feel him inhale, feel him getting a good whiff of you. You feel a little foul from the Arizona sun but he doesn’t seem to care. It just seems to turn him on more and he paws at you.

Tim’s putty in your hands by this point. You decide to play with him a little, test him while you know you hold him captive.

“Should I fuck you right here?” You take his jaw in your hand and yank his gaze to the living room. You let his imagination do the work. Maybe you would take him on the couch, or maybe you’d bend him over the counter where anyone could see you through the window over the kitchen sink.

Tim doesn’t stop grinding against your leg. You move your hand from his jaw to the back of his neck so you can guide him toward your bedroom. 

You push Tim onto the bed. He gropes himself over his pants as he watches you undress. 

You join him and reach for his skinny wrists, pinning them to the bed. “Hold still,” you tell him, and he follows your orders. He’s remarkably still as you rip your shirt over your head.

You work at his zipper. “Where’d you go? Vegas?” Las Vegas was less than two hours from your trailer in Kingman. It’d be nothing for Tim to drive it in a night, as you know he’s done before, mostly to piss you off. There’s a small cluster of gay clubs called the Fruit Loop near the university. You’d even found matchbooks from Gipsy on the back porch before, whether Tim left them there on purpose or not, you don’t know.

“Sometimes I need a real man,” Tim taunts. _Right. And that entails using a fake name and letting some muscle-bound jerk screw his brains out?_

“Ohh,” you groan, annoyed. You knock his hand away from his dick. “Give me one reason I should get you off.”

“Because I’m going to make you come, Mike,” Tim retorts, and you decide to have your way with him regardless.

You make out until Tim is mewling underneath you, grabbing at whatever he can. You roll yourselves over so that he’s crawling in your lap. You have to remember to pull away eventually so you can give him what he’s after, pushing him to his hands and knees. He assumes the position obediently, and you reward him with a stroke of your hand down his spine.

You open Tim up on one finger, then two. You lube yourself up and replace your thick fingers with your cock, gripping Tim’s hips as you press inside.

Tim’s always vocal but tonight he’s positively loud, gasping every time you drive into him. “More,” he babbles, and you try to oblige, thrusting harder, digging your fingers into his bicep as you try to fuck him the way he wants. You have him practically howling under your touch. His cheeks are flushed red, his knees shaking.

You press his body down, bearing all your weight against him. “Is this it? Is this what you wanted?” You fuck him harder. You’ll treat him like a whore if that’s what he really wants.

“Mike,” he whines, and it sounds like a plea, but you’re only happy he’s not pretending you’re someone else. 

You reach around him so you can jack him off, and it doesn’t take much before his come is spilling over your fingers and your name is spilling over his lips. “Mike, _Mike_,” he repeats, and you wring his orgasm out with your fingers.

“What’s my fucking name, Tim?”

“_Mike_,” he says again, low and hollow, barely comprehensible. He can’t deny who’s fucking him open, can’t ignore who is pinning him to the same ratty mattress where you’ve fucked him and held him and listened to him night after night.

The sound on his lips sends a quake up your spine and you come when you hear your name. Tim shakes underneath you, dry sobbing until you hold him to your chest and he starts to settle down. You can feel him sucking in air, trying to regain his breath as you try to even out the pace of your own breathing.

Tim stretches his lanky body out on the covers after you fuck. You trace his ribs with the tip of your index finger; more of them are visible than they ought to be.

Tired, you wonder how long he’ll stay this time.

“You don’t have to run away.”

“Are you asking me to stay?” Tim’s voice repeats the words you’ve heard him say before, and you realize it’s not a coincidence. He wants you to ask him to stay. You see that now.

You don’t know if you can.

Tim is a wanderer, a rambler, a rogue. You don’t really know where he plays into all this, you don’t know how the puzzle pieces fit with him and Lori. You can’t eat your cake and have it, too.

You can’t answer his question, so you hold him instead.

*

You marry Lori on July 25, 1994 at the Treasure Island Casino in Las Vegas. It’s a short engagement; you proposed a few short months earlier after Tim’s 26th birthday. You’d spent that particular weekend in April holed up in your trailer with Tim, high on crystal and fucking each other’s brains out. It’s the last time you see each other like that, without it really being on purpose. Things just work out that way. 

Tim agrees to watch your trailer during the honeymoon, and he even sticks around for a few days after you and Lori get back to Kingman. You can tell he’s making an effort (he really is), but you see the sad, quiet look in his eyes, the one he tries to quash when he sees you and Lori share a kiss or going to bed in the evening as he stalks off alone. Tim tries to blame his moodiness on the weed, but you’re starting to figure Tim out — at least you think so, until he disappears a few days later in August.

The next time you see Tim is the first time he talks about _the plan_, and you don’t know it, but it’s the beginning of the end.


End file.
